Shall We Dance
by korel.c
Summary: They are feeling so very lucky not to be heroes; but they take all the time they can get. Part III of the Triangle trilogy. Oneshot AU. TxS. -citrusy-


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**A/N: **Part III of the Triangle series. TxS

**Warning: **Highly overwritten. Implied sex.

**Disclaimer: **Standard.

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**Shall We Dance?**

* * *

He was a man - a boy - of not-so-tender years, now. Not lean, but not fat - she did not think that any of them would ever be, having seen the horrors they had seen, fighting every day.

Fighting on everyday alongside him, without him. He could not be everywhere, and the times that he was not - the times that she was not - the times that they were not around, their forces began to droop.

There were impossible situations, one after the other; implausible crisis, wave upon wave of swarms.

Was it then surprising that improbable things would come to pass in their own relationships?

To be a hero, one must have a great heart. To die a hero, one must have the tendency and the confidence, within themselves, to know that their sacrifice was worthwhile.

Tucker and Sam both considered themselves lucky that they were no heroes; considered themselves guardians of those who did.

One in particular.

Oh, for sure, all three of them saved each others' lives frequently. And oh, for sure, each had known each others' deepest secrets for since they were children. But Danny had something within him that the other two did not, and by that very lack, they grew closer.

That is not to say that they did not love him, of course, but to say that their intimacy grew into the greatest of levels, able to predict each other, where they followed each other's instructions unbiddingly.

They had had to develop that. Danny was almost desperate, and their equally almost desperate efforts to contain him from self-sacrifice required more and more split-second decisions and last-minute regrets.

Was it any surprise, then, that when there were moments of relative peace - when Danny was just toppling back from the brink of insanity, his ectoplasmic powers almighty and lashing in torrents and storms, wiping out all those who dared challenge him - that Tucker and Sam took advantage?

Sheltered each other from the storms outside, from their own emotions, looking away from the bitter cold and the bitter despair that suffused their daily fights to seek the warmth, glorious warmth, inside of them?

They thought not.

* * *

Today was one such day, only rendered different by the location they had chosen to express their intimacy, fellow seekers.

It was one that the boy-turned-man Tucker could have appreciated, long ago before the fights had all-but-eradicated the differences between him and any other fighter, albeit one with far more experience than otherwise.

It had been a last-ditch laboratory, a final-weapon project that had failed as they always did, come up against the might of the ectoplasmic swarms. This country's government had failed to believe them, failed to encompass the might of a thing so long a skeptical myth, failed to survive after the devastation passed over them.

It was metal, barren silver with moving parts and churning pistons, sill rotating gears and the quiet hum of computers and hisses of steam. The metal underfoot sparked occasionally as they trod across it, steel-capped and steel-lined, the chill of the teal-silver stealing across their bare necks and whispering in haunting chorus of their successes and exploits, what they had done. Failure, in the end.

Tucker and Sam ignored them. One, dressed in clean civilian clothes, muscular across his broad shoulders, clean of the remnants of ectoplasm. She, in a form-fitting violet-black leotard. Reverse-engineering Valerie's suit had brought on their own, improved versions.

So easy to put on.

So easy to take off.

He gestured with his chin over to a metal table, adorned with the tools of the fallen's trade; some probing tools, some electric, some she knew not what.

"So..." her voice was husky, hoarse; the first time she had had to talk since '12, to clarify his meaning.

He simply nodded, chocolate eyes twinkling with a spark she had not seen for months and months, and she smiled in relief, her own violet gaze gleaming in return.

"You or I, I believe you were asking?" His tone was no longer high and almost-squeaky, but low and mature and syrup smooth-rich, that set her bones to aching with her memories of what he did to her in and on these secret places; her mind backing away from the memories of what she did - had done - to _him._

No longer a boy, now. A man.

A man who pushed himself, easily and slowly, onto the chest-high bench and left her to gaze, unsure, at his quickly-unveiled stomach, toned and dark and sculpted. Scarred.

She ran a considering finger over the divisions, giggling softly as he jumped, watching the effect as her pale finger left goosebumps rising in a trail behind it.

"Sam," he was moaning, his dangling, muscular legs tensing and not-tensing as he struggled to remain control. He could not control his own semaphoric system, rising beyond his control.

She boosted herself up, using the free edges of the metallic table, to plop herself into his lap, nuzzling herself into his neck, communicating herself's own thoughts over the flesh-on-flesh contact.

"Hm-mm," she smiled at him, settling down into a kiss at the corner of his neck, breathing in his scent. It was soft, rich, musty, like old leatherbound books in a library under a cascade of sunlight. Not that many of those libraries existed anymore. This Earth was far too battered.

He hmed at her in return, wrapping his arms around her tightly and holding her close. "Who's taking the lead this time?" Resignation. But at the bottom, stirring: lust. Unhidden, unbarred.

"You choose --" and she is folding her warm legs around his, shedding her boots. The steel-lined boots clang to the ground, leaving an almost visible dent in the mirror-floor. "--But nothing too kinky. We don't have time, Danny's not likely to take long."

Tucker nods and leans back, shivering onto the cold metal table. He half-regrets picking this spot, as it is probably colder than even the floor, but it is slightly slanted and there are things to grab on to. He knows his grip can almost bend steel and that if he grabs onto Sam he will regret it. Boot or no she still has strong legs. And a very accurate aim.

"So, fast," he says, slightly disappointed. Sam just looks at him. "Okay, fast is good."

She softens, looks at him. They lock gazes for a moment, and then she huffs and undoes his pants for him. Slides out of her own clothes as quickly as possible.

They are naked, pale alabaster on dark, dark skin. They are poised and coiled and so very, very different - both muscular perhaps, but in each their own special way and strangely each other's -- she is muscular and angled and quite skinny; he is muscular and curved and very much built up, and if he were to be on top she would survive and perhaps enjoy it but then again, both of them like this way more.

* * *

There is no need for foreplay. Not here, not now. They haven't done this since six months ago, and the closest of intimacies - saving each others' lives, saving their closest friend's life, eating together, sleeping together for warmth and comfort, watching over each other as they bathe in streams or perform natural functions - there is no need for buildup when they have seen each other in the nude countless times.

...Moreover both of them've done this enough times to only really get quickly aroused in thoroughly strange situations, and being in a mad scientist's dream lab with screams outside and the buzz-zap of Danny's powers is definitely strange.

* * *

Their moves are almost businesslike, almost formal, almost silent; flowing, nonetheless. They have known each other for far too long to not know where each spot is their most sensitive.

For Sam it is just above the back of her knee, under her ribcage, her clit. Tucker uses them all in quick succession, his tongue and fingers roaming and playing her like the buttons on his sentimentally-kept PDA. He presses his back against the shiveringly cold table and grips onto and breaks the equipment on it, bucks now and then under her administration. His fingers are warm, her lips are warmer; his lips find them and reach.

For Tucker it is the skin just under his prostate and one finger run along it; the valleys between his muscles and bites along his neck - Sam plays with them all indiscriminately. One way or another, she gives as good as she gets - but still she is alternately jerking away in beautiful disguise and melting under his touch. His presence is a comfort, his lips are more so; her lips find them and explore.

Both of them can read the signs when the heat within them is about to explode; when their eyes are glazed and their limbs trembling is when Tucker finds her entrance and pushes himself in. No preparation, no warning except what she can read in his eyes, and she is not surprised.

And she is so, so, warm, and he is so, so, large. And they are both so, so, very needy.

* * *

It doesn't take that long before they are both done, keens too low for a female and too high for a male to fill the whispers of the ghostly air, to join the keens of the dead outside.

His back is warm. His front is warm.

It is wet inside. He pulls out and fumbles for his pants. There are tissues in his pocket.

He cleans her shakily and dresses, while she awakens, cat-like and lithe, pulling on her leotard with no issue whatsoever.

He has just put his shirt on when a whole corner of the building is torn away and the howling of thousands of ghosts grow louder.

He sighs. Takes the arm of his partner.

"Shall we dance?"

And then the ghosts are shrieking in and Danny is a wretched silhouette against the sky, ghosts succumbing to his random blasts and Tucker and Sam pull their suits from a portable Zone around them and their Thermoses are out and they are dancing.


End file.
